


Jesse's Job

by julischka



Category: Code Black (TV)
Genre: F/M, Psychological Trauma, Shameless Smut
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-04
Updated: 2016-01-15
Packaged: 2018-05-11 16:19:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,354
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5633119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/julischka/pseuds/julischka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Additional Scenes to 1x10 'Cardiac Support'. Jesse barely survived the heart attack. Now Leanne is fighting against her fear of losing him. May it be true that she is not alone?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The way to the wall

**Author's Note:**

> Yep. Shameless Neal Hudson appreciation-smut. Or: Sex without sex. And some feels thrown in.  
> (Still not a native speaker. Please excuse my Fren- English.)

After hours of staying as close to Jesse’s sickbed as she could while still having to do her job in the ER, she suddenly found herself hiding in a corner behind the least used stairwell, where she saw no one and no one saw her. Very faintly she heard the sounds of her colleagues working and their patients suffering. Then she didn’t hear anything anymore, only perceived a rushing in her ears and a pounding coming from somewhere inside her. After a few seconds Leanne realized that she was about to have a panic attack. Her knees were quivering and she fell backwards against a shelf, hitting her head which sent a shockwave of pain and anxiety through her, causing her breathing to get even more troubled. With a tunnel vision she tried to reach the opposite wall as if somehow there was some sort of salvation waiting for her once she touched the cold stone. She never did though.  
Before she could fall painfully on her knees there was a grip from behind her, holding her up and pressing her to a hard body. One arm went around her stomach, the other over her chest. She still didn’t hear anything; or whatever noises were picked up by her ears, they didn’t make it into her consciousness. What did penetrate the wall around her brain, however, was the feeling of someone behind her. A chest, that inflated with the person’s breaths, a warmth of a body that felt bigger than hers, and a vibration that hugged her back and permeated straight through, to her heart. Leanne let her head fall back while she deliberately worked on releasing her death grip on the person’s forearms. And for the first time since she had realized that Jesse was in mortal danger, she let go.  
At some point – after a pause of darkness and silence – she started to see faint lights and colors. And to her great pleasure the vibrations came back. She felt oddly relieved, although she was aware that she had been highly disoriented for quite some time. There was the dark shape of a person in front of her. The vibrations continued with small intermissions. Then her head cleared within seconds.  
“… once she realizes that. She’ll be fine.” “I’m sure she will be.” Rollie Guthrie smiled at her with his endless kindness and empathy. “I think we have her with us again.” “Leanne? Can you hear me?” She let out a big breath, conscious of her throat and her lungs for the first time since everything went to pieces around her. “Leanne, can you answer me, please? Do you know whe–“ “Oh god.” She flexed her fingers. Everything assaulted her at once. The muscles underneath her hands, the vibrations rumbling through her back, a heat source around her body warming her to the very core. A scent coming of the neck that was only millimeters from her lips when she pressed her head into the shoulder behind her. She knew that scent. “Leanne, please talk to me. I need to know if you’re alright.” She also knew that tone of voice, that accent. “Neal?” Even she could hear the surprise in that one word, in her own voice. The name of the man who was holding her, who’s frame she was pressed against. “I’m fine.” That came out a lot less steady than she would have wished. A slight turn of the head had her breathing a lot easier when she confirmed that there was no one else around. Not her colleagues standing in a circle, watching her, pitying her. “No one has found us here. It’s just you, Neal and me.” Rollie smiled knowingly. That man was a gift from heaven. She had known that for years now. She smiled back; it came easy.  
Leaning her head back, she looked up, pushing herself a little more upright, to see the face of her former student. How had she failed to realize for so long that Dr. Neal Hudson was no longer her subordinate. He was her equal, her confidante. Proving that thought right immediately, he started speaking in his low, breathy voice. ”I found you here by accident in the beginnings of a panic attack. Your breathing was very labored, your heart racing, you were unresponsive and about to fall down.” There were the vibrations again. She was almost used to them by now. She feared she might miss them later. “It has only been a few minutes, maybe five or six. I texted Dr. Guthrie. No one else knows.” At that point, with Neal knowing exactly what she needed without being given so much as a hint, she could not help but to let go, again. Because here was the revelation he had tried to make her understand yesterday. She still had Jesse, but she also had all of them. She had Neal.


	2. The way through the wall

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for your interest. :-)

He had the urge to put a hand on her shoulder or on her leg, to touch her. But it wasn’t needed, and maybe it wasn’t even wished-for. Her body was in close contact with Neal’s. And right now Leanne stayed that way – although she was clearly back to consciousness and aware of the position she was in – which surprised him to no end. It also frightened him, because the Leanne they all knew would never let that happen. Especially in front of someone else. Her only touchstone in the hospital had been Jesse for years now. But maybe that was about to change. Rollie hoped it did.  
Right now he witnessed a side of Leanne he never would have dreamed of being privy to. When her body dropped back again and her head forward, she let out a sigh or a giggle or a sob – or something merging all of the above – as her forehead touched Neal’s jaw. The sound didn’t stop. “We’ve got you, Leanne. And Jesse’s fine. He’s going to be fine, you know that.” Dr. Hudson tightened his arms around her, and Rollie finally gave in. He caressed her cheek, the one not pressed against her colleague’s collarbone. “Thank you. Thank you so much.” It was barely a whisper but more resounding than anything Leanne had said in the last few months.  
Neal looked as if he had seen a ghost. If this behavior of Dr. Rorish was astounding to himself, he could only guess how unexpected and astonishing it must seem for her former student. But Rollie knew that whatever Leanne would do or how out of character she would act, Neal would do his very best to have her back. That didn’t mean that he would only nod and agree, or that he would smile, stay back and keep his mouth shut. He had proven that his opinions were not only getting voiced but worth hearing, too. But being there for someone sometimes meant that you had to step on their feet and challenge them, to rattle them and call their bullshit. Neal felt a lot of respect for Dr. Rorish but he was not afraid to seem disrespectful if he felt that that was needed to protect her. Right now, no matter how out of his depth he felt and what repercussions he feared once Leanne came back to her old self, he seemed to take it in stride. A wetness, that was probably caused by Leanne’s tears, had collected at the base of Neal’s throat, soaking into the collar of his scrubs. Her hands were still gripping his thighs as if her life depended on that connection. Her breaths shuddered their way against his neck. Rollie relaxed and smiled. The young attending was nothing if not patient.  
After a few more seconds he started to feel his knees. “Are you good here?” Dr. Hudson nodded his consent. “Tell me if you need anything.” With his head tilted down and his eyes turned upwards, Neal’s answering smile was that charming mixture of mischief and kindness. They had really found a good one in that Brit.


	3. The way from the wall

“Do you feel better?” Leanne nodded. “Do you want to get up?” She nodded again. She took a deep breath. Yes, that was Neal. That was the way he smelled after a stressful double shift. Not bad! God knows, not bad at all. Quite the opposite actually.  
Suddenly it came back to her … There was one time when they had had a critical victim bleeding out on the ramp. He wasn’t stable for transport, his main artery was spouting blood all over the place. She was freezing in the cold night trying to focus solely on her thoughts and not her sensations. Neal was just coming in for his shift when Leanne shivered her way through an arterial clamping. Before she really knew what was going on he had taken over the clamp, stopping the bleeding in two seconds, after having shoved his warm fleece into her arms. Despite her half-hearted protest she finally slipped into the fleece jacket. She’d worn that piece of clothing for hours. Neal never said anything. When she was finally in the locker room to change she didn’t pull her arms through the bloody sleeves. She just pulled the collar up to her nose and stood there, thinking that no one she knew made it seem that natural and effortless to –  
Neal chuckled lowly. “Or not. That’s alright. You’re the boss here.” Leanne realized that she hadn’t moved an inch. She really didn’t wish to, either. Also she had been right: She already missed the vibrations Neal’s torso sent through her, whenever he spoke. “How are you?” “Me?? Why would you ask me that? I’m fine.” Okay, maybe that hadn’t been the most intelligent question in their situation. She had just wished for him to talk some more. “I don’t know … I have to get up, right?” “You don’t have to do anything. If sitting here helps then that’s what we’re going to do.” Her smile ached in her cheeks. How could she ever think that there was no one out there able and willing to deal with her pains besides Jesse?  
Finally, still sitting, she pulled herself away from him. With a little bit of distance between her and Neal she turned around to look at him. That was when the extent of her breakdown hit her. She had sat between his legs, turned a little sideways, pressed against his front. Her hands were slowly letting go of his thighs now. The way her fingers hurt, when she did that, meant she must have really had a hard clutch on his extremities. The collar of his shirt was dark with wetness on one side and there was a fresh, long scratch on the other side of his throat. He looked tired, exhausted even, shadows on his face. It had been one hell of a day, even more so for him than for her. But he smiled at her.  
One side of his mouth and his cheek pulled up, his right eye squinted a little. Neal’s glance winked up from his typically lowered face. He was smiling at her as if she had given him a prize. As if he was about to thank her for letting him in on her secret club. As if he appreciated her. She let out a shocked breath. Nothing was right anymore. She didn’t understand any of it. Had things changed that quickly? Or had they been different from what she was used to for a while now? What else had she missed?  
She pushed herself into a standing position. A little too fast to soon maybe. When she swayed sideways, his hands were on her upper arms, steadying her. “Oh god.” “What is it? Are you okay?” “Yeah, yeah. I’m alright now.” Her eyes found his throat again. “God, Neal, I’m so sorry for this. I really lost it and I don’t …” Almost involuntarily her fingers found the skin around the red welt she must have placed on his neck. “It’s absolutely fine. You have nothing to apologize for.” She snorted, looking at the broken skin. “I strongly disagree. But fine, be the gentleman. If you insist.” Laughing, he softly pried her hand away from his body, before bending down and picking his cellphone up of the ground. Leanne took that opportunity to take a deep breath.

This was bad. Something like this could never happen again! Of course being his ever observant and irritatingly considerate self, nothing got by Neal. “Okay, you’re going to hate me for suggesting this, but we should really get you checked out. Do a full worku–” She was already shaking her head. “No, Leanne, listen to me. If that had happened to anybody else in this hospital, you would insist on exact–“ “They’re patients. I’m a physician.” Neal smirked. “Right now you’re a mess.” Her death glare had little effect on him.  
“Nobody has to learn about any of th–“ With a sharp wiping motion of her hand she cut of his attempt to sway her. To get her to acknowledge her breakdown, to make a big deal out of it. She knew what was going on, she didn’t need her younger colleague in mother hen-mode, thanks a lot.  
“Leanne, you can’t just skip over this like nothing happ–“  
“Oh, don’t give me that! I know all about breakdowns, therapy and psychological trauma counseling, believe me. There is no need for you to get involved.”  
Neal recovered quickly but she had still been able to recognize the pain this harsh brush off had caused him. She couldn’t deal with this right now. This wasn’t about him or about her. Jesse was fighting to survive. She was needed. And god, she needed Jesse.  
Jesse never looked at her like that, like Guthrie and Hudson did. When Jesse hugged her, it wasn’t to but balm on the sore patches of her soul, it was to press the dark, angry and excruciating feelings out of her. Their love was a hard one.  
This was soft. She could not be soft.  
She through one last, thin smile at Neal and walked away purposefully.


End file.
